By Benjamin Gilad, ACI Faculty
Our new Winter program took place last week at the beautiful new campus of Northeastern University in Charlotte, NC. We hope to come back there repeatedly as we keep expanding our programs nationally.
You can judge how well it went by Theresa Ensign’s post on Linkedin: “Exhausted, brain fried, professionally on fire and officially… a Certified ACI CIP-I (Competitive Intelligence Professional). And, new member of the FGH Academy of Competitive Intelligence Alumni!”
That in itself is so gratifying. We pride ourselves in challenging our trainees in ways no other program can. But one comment added a cherry on top of Theresa’s write up. Stuart DeGeus of Little Caesar Pizza (is there any other pizza?), one of my favorite VPs (only a few get this designation), wrote: “Congratulations from an alum and one who uses what he learned every day!”
Faculty Chris Dent stated “It’s very rewarding to see the attendees respond with enthusiasm to the principles of competitive intelligence. They come from a wide array of industries and companies and yet after only a modest period of instruction, they are all able to speak a new common language.” We want you to all speak this common CI language.
One of the things our accreditation agency, the IACET, keeps examining is how we keep our program current, high quality, effective and applicable. The examination process is exhaustive and rigorous and very time consuming and I must admit there were moments when I said to myself, why do we need it? Many know me in this field, and not one of our competitors is accredited by an external continuing education association. But as IACET challenges us, we keep on our toes to challenge our students. Stuart’s comment suggests we actually reached this goal.
Thanks guys. You make it easy to keep teaching. And Theresa, you will get to the CIP-II one day as I know that is on your wish list. I promise.
Our February 2018 Winners of the Blindspots and Cross-Competitor Analysis Analytical Competition with Dr. Ben Gilad:
Julia Uglietta from Engility, Jennifer Marrion from Engility, Wayne Detzler from Cargill, Bhadra Menon from Cargill, David Sullivan from Texas Mutual Insurance and Theresa Ensign from Michael’s. Congratulations!
